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The
Rotting Reputation of Ronald Reagan, Part 1: Prologue to a
Lethal Legacy
May
11, 2001
by Neuvocat
It seems that as of the last 20 years especially, the Conservative
Republican ethos has eroded from being God-fearing to the
more selfish one of "every man for himself," which
largely came about as a result of Ronald Reagan, who was nothing
less than the carrier of a political plague that had stricken
our nation.
Delusion often accompanies sickness and the ones who were
infected with such a side effect were the ones who did not
have the sort of values and judgment needed to resist it.
In their madness they celebrated Reagan as a war hero-although
he never served in combat. They also thought that dignity
was restored to our nation's capital. It was well known back
then that among other things, the Reagan administration took
to humiliating people by means of strip-searches just outside
the White House - in view of the public - when at best the
supposed offenses these people committed were grossly exaggerated
(something quite akin to Christie Todd Whitman's frisking
scandal floating around these days).
Another vivid example of such scandalous behavior surfaced
about when Reagan's Attorney General Edwin Meese documented
his pornography hunt in a government publication. Ironically
the publication's descriptions of sex acts were so graphic
that it became a best seller for smut-hounds everywhere. What
began as an assault on civil liberties became an embarrassing
backfire that caused grave humiliation to the Reagan Administration.
These diseased minds also thought Reagan made the country
a better place to live in, when in fact he compromised the
national character in ways that were unprecedented. For one,
he perverted of Franklin Delano Roosevelt's tactic of economic
stimulation by deficit spending. Reaganomics was no more than
a pyramid scheme. Conservatives engaged in the bald-faced
lie that they stood for lower taxes when the reality is that
Reagan signed the biggest tax increase ever in U.S. History.
Bush Sr. signed what was then the second biggest in violation
of his "No New Taxes" campaign pledge.
The diseased minds would also like to daydream about a stronger
military when in fact he completely compromised its effectiveness
as a whole by spending obscene amounts of money on weapons
and training that were totally useless or unnecessary. This
compromised the lives of many soldiers like the 40 Marines
in Lebanon who didn't have enough security to protect them
from a suicide-minded terrorist.
Reagan was also a man who turned back the clock when it came
to the safety of the populace. He relaxed the rules on the
Food and Drug Administration as well as the Federal Aviation
Administration with very real and very disastrous results.
Reagan also set back research on AIDS, proclaiming it a homosexual
disease. Sadly enough Reagan didn't reverse his position even
when 14-year-old Ryan White lost his life as a result of being
infected with the virus after a blood transfusion. No, it
had to take the death of the flamboyant Rock Hudson for Reagan
to see how moot sexual orientation was.
He also did much to turn back civil-rights legislation in
order to favor white-owned big businesses and split up the
poor working class to keep it at odds with itself in very
polarized factions. Race relations were set back so dramatically
that we're still trying make amends for it more than a decade
later.
Those of us who didn't suffer from the widespread dementia
still had to deal with the fact that an aging, two-bit actor
got elected. We also had to deal with the nausea brought on
by the media onslaught, largely devoid of critical thinking
and criticism. Our stomachs churned in response to all the
anger and hatred that characterized his administration.
Through all this Reagan played his role like he wasn't responsible
for anything that ever went wrong. He always said that he
was addle-minded and he had been known to believe his own
lies quite often. Reagan suffered from his own delusions while
he draped himself in the American Flag. It was bound to happen
since he used it more as a cloak to hide the guilt and shame.
Escaping reality has its price - and in Reagan's it was a
tremendous one. He now suffers from Alzheimer's, which he
quite possibly could have avoided had he not suspended funding
for research.
At this point he probably doesn't even remember ever being
President, which some might consider a sign from the Almighty
Himself about what He thinks of selfish, self-righteous conservatives.
On
to Part 2: The Legacy of Deception
and Division
The author wishes to give credit to tsstranger, who gave
him the inspiration for the title of this article.
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